


an answer, to a story

by legendofkuvira (jephaway)



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Loss, Memory Loss
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-29
Updated: 2017-08-29
Packaged: 2018-12-21 06:46:00
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11938542
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jephaway/pseuds/legendofkuvira
Summary: Taako misses something that he cannot quite remember.





	an answer, to a story

**Author's Note:**

  * For [hops](https://archiveofourown.org/users/hops/gifts).



The first time he does it, he’s about to step out for the first _Sizzle it Up_ show. He’s nervous. The sound of the crowd on the other side of the thin wall makes his heart race. He knows they’ll love him. He’s _Taako_. He checks everything two, three, four times just to make sure and Sazed tells him to relax but he can’t. Pacing frantically back and forth across the kitchen, double and triple checking his reflection. Something feels wrong. Something is missing.

Sazed tells him he’s got three minutes to get his shit together, and Taako reaches out with his left hand as if he expects someone to be there to take hold. His breathing hitches and for a moment he feels lightheaded, his vision out of focus, ears ringing. Finding nothing but air, Taako clenches his fist and lowers his arm to his side. He’s been alone all his life so why does he feel so lonely?

* * *

 

The second time he does it, it’s in his sleep. Nights after Glamour Springs, sleeping in an Inn with a fake name and a fake face, Taako has a nightmare. Forty faces, forty pairs of hands, reaching out to him, screaming at him, _you killed us_. He reels backwards, and when he lifts his hands to his face, there’s blood on them. Screaming back, hands on his face, pulling him down into the crowd. He kicks against them as they tear at his clothes, and all his clothes are red. As they swarm him, he gets one glimpse of black night sky and a thousand eyes, and a figure in a red cloak-

He wakes with a start, and his hand reaches out for someone. The feeling in his chest tells him someone is supposed to be lying next to him but when he tries to think of who, his ears start to ring. Sazed never shared a bed with him. Taako had never slept with someone at his side. _Who did he reach for_? It feels like an almost-memory, of someone he knew before he was himself. A dream, maybe. Reaching for phantoms, like the ones in his dream. Was there someone before, or has he always been alone? Taako had no childhood friends or long-lived lovers. He had no siblings, no family to search for. He was a ghost reaching for a ghost. Nothing more.

Feeling foolish, Taako climbs out of bed. He dresses in the dark and retrieves his cloak from the floor. He steals a moment, running the dark red fabric between his fingers, and he wants to think something but he can’t form a coherent thought. Feeling as if he’s leaving something heavier than his life behind, Taako slips out into the anonymity of midnight.

* * *

 

The third time he does it, he’s standing in a cave with two others. He watches as Merle is launched across the room by the force of the staff and Taako immediately reaches out to try and claim it for himself. It’s like gravity, or magnetism, the way his hand wraps around the firm, curved handle of the umbrella, and pulls it from the grip of the skeleton. It feels like _lightning_ crackling through his veins. Attuned. Bonded.

There’s something special about this moment. Staff in hand, standing over this skeleton clad in red, Taako feels like he knows her. No face, no identity, it’s as if they’re one in the same. Who was Taako without his fame and glamour and flashy things? Who was this skeleton without her living umbrella and her deep crimson robe? Familiarity in the unknown draws Taako in as she turns to dust before him.

It’s a sight that makes his mouth run dry, and as he and his companions move to the next place, he can’t shake the queasy, anxious feeling of not knowing who the woman in the red robe was. What brought her here, how did she die? These are the questions that trip over themselves in his head, and when he comes close to an answer, to a story, he can’t think of a satisfactory conclusion.

* * *

 

The fourth time he does it, he’s standing in front of a word burned into the wall. Three letters. L. U. P. His stomach turns itself into knots as he stares. Lup. Lup. The umbrastaff quivers in his hand and Taako tightens his grip on the handle. What was the staff trying to tell him? What is Lup? _Who_ is Lup? The thought makes his head throb and his ears ring and when he tries to answer the question his throat tightens up.

Lup. A flash of blonde hair, and static. A laugh, and static. A time, maybe a place, his hands are covered in pink dye but why? His hair’s never been pink before in his life. He hears feedback from a microphone. A hand. A word. A look. Static. Static. Static. He can’t think, can’t remember. He mutters it, stupefied.

Lup.

Static.

He reaches out with his left hand and finds Angus, anxiously watching, but it’s not good enough.

* * *

 

The fifth time he does it, he’s in the dome. A battle crashes around him and he reaches for the staff as Angus throws it to him. He remembers her now. He remembers the times he would reach out and find her hand there, ready to face whatever came next. He remembers the nights as a child that he would wake up terrified and she was there too. He remembers her face, and her laugh, and her name.

Lup.

He cracks the staff over his knee and as he does there’s a rush of wind and light and then there’s Lup. Phantasmal and resplendent. And he reaches for her one last time.


End file.
